[dropcap]O[/dropcap]n their website, Coco Guzman begins the description of The Demonstration by quoting historian Eric Hobsbawm who writes that “next to sex, the activity combining bodily experience and intense emotion to the highest degree is the participation in a mass demonstration.” [pullquote-right]“Next to sex, the activity combining bodily experience and intense emotion to the highest degree is the participation in a mass demonstration.”[/pullquote-right]Like with sex, the participation on the front line of a demonstration, in an act of civil disobedience, or in any form of oppositional performance where you put your body on the line, the spectrum of experienced emotions...

January 1, 2006 was the day Abdelkader Belaouni entered into a self-imposed sancutary at St-Gabriel’s Church in the Pointe Saint-Charles neighbourhood of Montréal. On January 6, I visited Kader on the second floor of the rectory where he has spent much of the last 1100 days to avoid deportation back to Algeria.

[MONTRÉAL] In many cities across Canada, demonstrations were held yesterday in support of the people of Gaza and the end of the Israeli bombardment of the coastal Palestinian territory. Based on the media representations of the various protests, including Toronto, Ottawa, Vancouver, Montréal‘s was the biggest in the country. But exactly how many people were there? Who decides and how are the protesters counted? The air was frigid, hovering at around -16 degrees Celcius. Not too much wind and a bright sun made the 1.5 km walk bearable as the crowd made their way north along Peel street from Dorchester...